


To Let Go

by OwenToDawn



Series: Your Weary Days Seem Far Away [2]
Category: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time
Genre: Assisted Suicide, Character Study, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hopeful Ending, Link and Zelda are still alive at the end don't worry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-15 10:41:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29187966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OwenToDawn/pseuds/OwenToDawn
Summary: Dark had no such comfort. If Ganon were to return, any life he built for himself could be ripped away, destroyed by his own hands if Ganon so wished it, and with such a threat looming over him with no hope of rescue from it, the only agency he could exercise was to remove himself from Ganon’s control entirely.“It’s not fair,” Link says as Madwebiisaan starts across the bridge. The sun approaches the peaks of Death Mountain in the distance.“Of course not. But it is all I have left.”
Relationships: Dark Link & Link (Legend of Zelda), Link & Zelda (Legend of Zelda)
Series: Your Weary Days Seem Far Away [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2021758
Comments: 10
Kudos: 23





	To Let Go

**Author's Note:**

> We're here! Finally the first of a few spin-off one shot ideas. I'm starting with something pretty heavy so please tread with caution. I wrote a lot about the concept of agency in this and that's the major theme here. I hope it comes through properly
> 
> Title from Uleum by Mokyo
> 
> Comments and kudos are of course loved

The air is cool even in the light of the sun as it whispers across the grass and pulls at Link’s cloak. Beside him, Zelda crouches to pick up her glove that she’d dropped. He glances up the ridge towards the Shrine of Resurrection, the entrance glowing with the golden light of the barrier he’d asked Zelda to put in place to keep the Sheikah from having access. There’s a lot they still haven’t discussed. Things they need to discuss. But this…this has to be taken care of before it becomes a bigger issue.

“The creature you think is inside…you say it’s come for the Links of the past as well?” Zelda asks.

“Yes,” Link says. “It…it never speaks, not that I can remember. It’s just violent.”

“But if that’s truly what powers the shrine, it saved you this time, didn’t it?” she asks.

Link nods. “Perhaps. But perhaps it was forced to help by the machine itself, I don’t really know. That’s why I wanted to check.”

“Alone.”

He looks back at her and he can see the displeasure in her brow the way he so clearly could in the past too. It hurts to see. In many ways, they are the same, and he wants to let her in, but this…feels far too personal.

“I…it’s just…”

“Go on,” she says. “I may not be happy, but I understand. I am here if you need me, but I will only come if you ask, okay?”

He nods. He hears the warning in her words as well. For all he knows, for all he expects if he’s honest, this could turn into a deadly fight, but he’s prepared for that potential. He appreciates that she’s willing to let him handle that danger alone if he truly insists. It’s…a show of trust. One he hopes he can return one day, when things are better between them.

Warmth radiates out from the see-through golden barrier he approaches at the entrance to the shrine. He reaches out to touch it, but his hand slips through. It’s like reaching into warm honey. When he glances back at Zelda, she doesn’t seem surprised.

“My barrier works only against the rest of the world. Not…not you,” Zelda says. “Never you, Link.”

That stirs something in his chest he doesn’t want to examine too closely and he turns back around to push his way through instead. The cave is darker than it was the last time he was here. Evidence of Kilton’s presence is obvious – black malice oozes in spots on the floor, becoming thicker and pulsing with malignant power as he steps further towards where he had once rested. He picks his way closer, ignoring the way the hair on the back of his neck sticks up.

Peering into the capsule he’d once laid in, he no longer sees the clear water of before, only a pool of bubbling malice. He steps away and looks for some place to sit. He settles on the far back corner, his gaze on the exit and the pool itself, and draws his sword to let it rest across his knees with his hand on the hilt. There’s a presence here. He can feel it watching him, but there are no eyes to be found in the malice.

“It’s just us now,” he says. “And I’m not leaving.”

The cavern shakes, the sound of gravel hitting the floor both in the main room and the tunnel that leads outside as well. Link clenches his jaw tight and doesn’t respond. He’s not sure if this creature, this dark replica of himself, hates him or is merely a hurt and aching creature like Majora. It’s best, he thinks, if he extends a hand as a friend instead of a foe. It’s hard though, when the nightmares of a malice-infused version of himself choking the life from him sit so close to the surface of his mind.

“I don’t want to hurt you, even if you want to hurt me,” Link says.

**_Liar_ **

The voice seethes the word in his mind, clawing at the inside of his skull and Link tightens his grip on his sword. It begins to glow in response, but not in his grip. No. It glows in response to the malice that begins to creep across the floor to the capsule, writhing.

“Are we a part of each other?” Link asks. “Is that how you’re in my head? I can feel you.”

No sooner do the words leave him does the hand around the hilt begin to burn and he has to bite his lip to stop from crying out as he drops it. The leather of his glove begins to melt, malice dripping through it. He stares down, trying to resist the panic that rises up in him at the sight. When he blinks, the malice is gone and his glove is perfectly intact.

**_Coward_ **

"I’ve had my body used against my will enough times that I’m not too thrilled at the idea of someone else giving it a go,” Link says, though it’s impossible to keep his voice calm. “So you can mess with my head, huh?”

**_Only here_ **

The malice is gone from the room and tunnel as far as Link can tell, undoubtedly gathered back into the pool. It makes him question why the creature hadn’t reassembled itself weeks ago after Kilton’s violation of this place and the power contained inside.

“I’m sorry Kilton hurt you,” Link says. “He won’t be coming back.”

**_Should have killed. Weak_ **

“Refusing to kill isn’t a weakness,” Link says.

The cavern shakes again and Link darts forward to grab the Master Sword, though still he doesn’t stand to use it.

**_Me. I am weak_ **

“Oh.” Link swallows. He thinks of how every time he’s recovered his memories, he’s left feeling drained and powerless, exhausted. Perhaps that was true with this creature too. Kilton had ripped him apart for something to use and he hadn’t had the energy to put himself back together, not until there was another threat. “I don’t think you’re weak.”

**_Coward_ **

“Yes, I know,” Link says. “I want to help you though. I’m not going to let Kilton or the Sheikah come here, but I was hoping…I could help maybe.”

He waits, but the creature does not speak again, leaving him instead in silence. In all honesty, he just grateful he decided not to make the cavern shake or make him hallucinate again. He’s no good at talking, but he thinks maybe he’s going to have to if they’re going to get anywhere. Clearly the creature has no interest in engaging first.

“I’m trying to change things, me and Zelda,” he says. “We realize that…there’s no way to stop Ganon forever, and there’s no way to guarantee safety for everyone, but we want to at least stop things like this from happening to you. And me. We um…” He’d been doing so well, but the words dry up in his throat.

**_Rest_ **

“You want to rest?” Link asks. When he doesn’t get a response, he continues on. “Me too.”

**_Puppet. Ganon. Sheikah. You_ **

Link pauses, trying to put the words together. “Um…are you trying to say you were a puppet to Ganon, and then the Sheikah, and then me?”

The air in the shrine feels a little less hostile as soon as he speaks and he relaxes his grip on his sword.

**_Smart coward_ **

“Gee, thanks,” Link says, unable to help but laugh a little. “I’m sorry that you were forced to do things against your will. I’m happy to be alive still, but I’m sorry that you had to be hurt for that to happen.”

**_Both puppets_ **

Link nods. “Yeah, and Zelda too. None of us get a choice, we just play our roles, over and over.”

**_Cannot stop_ **

It’s easier to understand what he means, Link thinks, perhaps because in a way they are connected and the more they interact, the more this creature is in his head, the easier it is to communicate. He thinks that…maybe that should be concerning. It’s not though.

“I know we can’t erase our roles, but we can at least stop dragging others like you into the mess and treating them like sacrificial pieces,” Link says.

Once again, his words don’t get a response. He lets go of the Master Sword without really thinking, his fingers feeling too weak to keep holding it. It clatters to the ground and he thinks…he thinks maybe that’s a problem too. He swallows and reaches for the sword, but he’s so…exhausted?

**_Silly_ **

Link feels his breath catch in his throat as he watches a malice made hand grip the edge of the capsule. “What’s silly?” Even speaking feels hard.

The energy in the shrine no longer feels relaxed, and his fear only mounts as the creature sits up. His eyes glow like they had in his nightmares. It’s worse in real life. He tries to move for the Master Sword again as the creature stands but his body won’t cooperate and he watches as the creature’s movements become smoother with each motion. He steps out of the capsule, malice pooling at his feet as he stands and steps toward him.

“You thought you could just come here, connected as we are, and I would welcome you with open arms?” the creature asks with his voice, a mocking parody when it comes out of malice-tinged lips.

Link tries to speak but he can’t. **_Please…_**

“Please,” the malice creature mocks as it moves towards him, kicking the Master Sword away before kneeling before him. “I gave you the strength to come back to life against my will. Isn’t it only fair that you return the favor?”

He wants to run. He wants to just leave and never come back and he can’t believe he made the mistake of coming here in the first place. Did he truly have no sense of self-preservation?

His head spins and he shuts his eyes. When he opens them again, the Master Sword is still in his hand and there’s no malice creature standing before him. He sucks in a deep breath. As he lets it out, he can feel himself shake and tremble. It’s painful, the way he was honest about how much he didn’t want to be messed with in that way, and in response this creature had done something even worse than before. Even so, he finds it hard to be angry. He gets why. The creature is just lashing out at anyone who’s hurt him, and Link is among those. At least, he is in the creature’s mind.

**_You won’t kill_**

 ** _"_** What do you mean?” Link asks. “What won’t I kill?”

**_Me_ **

He closes his eyes against his better judgment and lets his head thud back against the stone wall. “No. I won’t. If all I can do is lock you in here and keep you safe from the outside world and the outside world safe from you, then that is what I will do. I had hoped…I don’t know what I hoped.”

The energy of the room once more mellows out, but Link doesn’t trust it this time. Even so, he doesn’t open his eyes. He can’t bring himself to, not when he can’t trust what he sees. He thinks of Majora. He thinks of the creature of his nightmares, driven mad by loneliness, lashing out and destroying everything because he had been bent and broken and used against his will, trapped in a mask for the use of others.

“How long have you been in this shrine?” Link asks.

He’s met with silence. That might be answer enough, really, because as far as he knows, these shrines are ten thousand years old, maybe even older, and if this dark creature, this dark version of himself has existed since the Hero of Time…who knows how long he’d been trapped here. Held, waiting for the right time to be used against his will to save another puppet. It reminds him of how he’d told Sidon it was hard to be angry when it was something he was used to.

And yet he finds himself enraged on behalf of the creature trapped in this shrine, even as that same creature lashed out at him. Still, it’s not as if he can apologize on behalf of the Sheikah. Not when he knew they weren’t sorry, and really, he doubts Zelda would be all that sorry either since this shrine was what allowed him to come back. In that regard…he’s not sorry he’s still alive. He is sorry that it required this sort of harm to come to someone else though.

**_Too long_ **

“You want me to kill you, don’t you?” Link asks, finally opening his eyes. “That’s why you’re lashing out at me. You want to provoke me into killing you.”

**_Yes_ **

He gets it. Really, he does. The exhaustion that comes with the roles they are forced to play whether it’s Hylia or Ganon thrusting the roles upon them feels like far too much to bear sometimes. Unlike Majora, unlike this dark creature, he has the benefit of having friends. He has the benefit of experiences and joys that make such a burden easier to bear. He isn’t trapped and alone. Not anymore.

“I want to talk to you for real. Obviously…obviously like this it’s hard. I get that,” Link says. “Sometimes, I can’t talk out loud at all and I have to communicate other ways. When you were in my head, you could talk to me. Do you think…do you think you could do that again so we can talk easier with each other?”

**_You would allow?_ **

Which okay, sure, maybe it is really stupid to invite someone who just made him hallucinate in a way that was so hurtful to come back into his mind. But...he doesn’t know how else to help if they can’t communicate properly. He knows what it’s like to struggle to communicate properly but not have the means to do so in a different way.

“Yeah. I’m allowing you to do it. If you take advantage of me though, I’m just going to leave again.”

Now that he’s looking for it, it’s easy to notice the shift, the way the world seems to move just a hair out of focus. Between one blink and the next, he has the creature made of malice wearing his face sitting before him, his own dark copy of the Master Sword lying across his lap. He takes a deep breath to keep the fear away.

“You knew the Hero of Time,” Link says. He doesn’t mean to, it just sort of spills out of him.

“Yes. I was created to fight him, but I am not the only creature like this,” he says. His voice sounds like Link’s, but distorted as well, pitched somewhat higher.

"What should I call you?” Link asks.

“I don’t have a name.”

Link blinks because that seems obvious, but it’s also…sad. Sure, his name is shared across eons, but he still has a name, but then he supposes if you are left alone for a millennium you don’t need a name. Majora was someone before he was put in a mask. “What do you want to be called?”

"Dark.”

“Why that?” Link asks.

“It is what I was made from,” Dark says. “If it is my essence, is it not me?”

It was a logical answer, certainly not one Link could argue with, and yet… “Just because it’s what you were made from doesn’t mean that’s all you have to be.”

“I cannot leave here. What is the point of being anything else if I am just meant to stay here and help bring you back to life if you or the princess manage to get yourself killed?”

"She’s a queen now,” Link says. Dark can’t roll his eyes given that they are just burning red orbs, but Link feels that if he could, he would be. Oddly, it brings a smile to his lips.

"The fact remains I cannot leave. There is no reason to aspire to be something more than what Ganon made me to be,” Dark says. “The Sheikah found me in the Water Temple after Ganon’s defeat during that time, and saw fit to imprison me until they found a use for me. What experiences am I meant to long for?”

“What experiences do you know of?” Link asks.

"Everything you experienced before you died.”

Link supposes that confirms his suspicion that he and Dark are connected to each other, but more importantly, it raises an issue that makes Link…hurt. “There was nothing of my life before I died that seemed…enjoyable?”

“No.”

The word, though expected, hurts like a punch to the gut. His life in the past, devoid of any true friendship, or friendship that wasn’t rife with unresolved feelings of jealousy and guilt, wasn’t something he wanted to return to. He likes where he is now. But to hear that someone viewed all of his experiences from that time and deigned none of them to be worth experiencing themselves…well.

“What about now though?” Link asks. He looks back into Dark’s eyes. “If you look in my mind and see the life I’ve lived now, is there anything you want?”

Feeling someone rifle through his memories is an odd sensation. It’s hard to explain the way he can feel his memories being picked apart, sudden emotions welling forth only to melt away a moment later. He waits though. He lets the emotions ebb and flow through him as Dark sorts through them all, or rather, the ones that must draw his attention. It does make him wonder though.

“How come I never feel you in my head the rest of the time?”

“I can only get in your head like this if you’re here,” Dark says. A moment later his presence seems to retract out of Link’s mind and back to what it was earlier. “I don’t claim to understand why this place works the way it does, I only know how it does.” He tils his head to the side. “Your life since you’ve awoken is much more intriguing, but it doesn’t matter. I cannot leave.”

“I can have Zelda look,” Link says. “She’s really smart. She can maybe figure it out and we can…maybe we can figure something out for you.”

"Why are you so determined to let someone free who’s purpose was to kill you?”

“Maybe it was at some point,” Link says with a shrug. “But I also have a horse who…was once Ganon’s mount and he likes me fine. Just because you were created to do something doesn’t mean you have to.”

"Would you say the same about your own identity?”

"Yes,” Link says.

“Even if you refusing to fulfill it means that Ganon wins?”

Link swallows and then nods. “If there was ever a Link who did not want to risk his life for this…I’d understand. I wanted to, and others in the past have, but I…knowing the burden it is, I don’t think I could ever begrudge someone from running from such a role. But maybe Hylia only chooses people who are willing.”

“You’re less of a puppet now, but you still are, aren’t you?” Dark says. “In the past, all you did was set aside your own feelings and thoughts so you could bear the burdens of others. It was miserable to see. And even now, you still would risk your life for people who are not grateful.”

“Yes,” Link says. “Even if it’s upsetting, I would. But I told you when I came here…the whole reason I’m here is I’m trying to make sure things are done better in the future, that we won’t…that we won’t rely so heavily on power that is not freely given.”

"Hm. Zelda may come examine the Shrine. Keep in mind I will not be able to speak with her as I speak to you here as I cannot enter her mind. I am connected only to you,” Dark says. “I might only be able to manage a few words like before.”

“It’s okay. You can listen to what we discuss, right?”

Dark nods and when Link blinks, he vanishes and the last remnants of his presence in Link’s mind vanish with him. When he looks around, the malice is still in the pool. He sets his sword down and grabs his Sheikah Slate, typing out a message to Zelda to tell her she can come in and then setting it back in its clip on his belt before standing up. He approaches the place he’d slept for a hundred years. The water that he’d woken up is nowhere to be seen, just seething malice.

Perhaps it had something to do with Kilton’s interference. Who knows what he could’ve done if Dark hadn’t fought back as best he could in such a state. It makes his stomach churn.

**_Soft puppet_ **

“Link?” Zelda’s voice echoes through the cavern and he hears the sound her jumping down the ledge that leads to the shrine. A moment later she appears in the entrance, recoiling when she steps in a stray pool of malice that hadn’t made its way back to the capsule. “What…happened here?”

“Kilton,” Link says. “When I woke up, it was just water. I don’t know who tipped him off that there was something more here, but he tried to harness the power of the creature that powers this and I…I don’t think he can go back to normal. I was hoping maybe you could…figure out how we could free him.”

“Link, it’s a creature made from Ganon’s power. It’s made of malice,” she says, raising her eyebrows.

“It’s a he, actually, and um, he said he wants to be called Dark,” Link says. “And I know that’s who made him but Madwebiisaan was Ganon’s mount thousands of years ago and he just wants to be left alone.”

“Well…tell Dark that I’m not trying to hurt him so he better not attack me,” Zelda says, pulling the Sheikah Slate from her own belt hook and crouching down beside the capsule.

**_Understood_ **

“He says he won’t,” Link says.

Zelda nods and begins to poke around at the capsule, then going over to the console that controls it and then coming back. Different things glow and beep. At one point the malice begins to bubble and pop before settling back down again. She frowns, taps a few buttons on her slate and out of the top come two small flat discs.

“Link, come here,” she says. “I need some of your blood, just a little.”

Link tugs a hunting knife from his belt and pricks the tip of his right index finger, holding it above the small disc while Zelda squeezes it so some of the blood plops down. Then she pulls her own knife from her belt and uses that to extract malice from the pool and place it on the other disc before shoving them back into the Sheikah Slate and the contraption whirs with noise.

“I’m just trying to see how much of this specific malice contains you and vice versa,” she says. She glances over at him. “Robbie and I redesigned my Sheikah Slate to be capable of small-scale lab experiments like this while I’m in the field. I didn’t realize it would come in handy so soon.”

“I appreciate it,” he says.

She offers a smile in response and then looks back down at the Sheikah Slate. It’s another few minutes of her poking through things before finally she slips her Sheikah Slate back in its clip on her belt with a frown.

"I’m sorry, but Dark cannot be extracted from this Shrine and survive. The best we could feasibly do is help him integrate more fully into your mind, but though you are connected, the threads between you are far too weak for it to remain stable. You’d have…hours at best before he would disappear forever,” she says.

“And the shrine would no longer work, would it?” Link asks.

“I don’t think either of us give a damn if the thing works if the cost is torturing a creature out of his mind with misery,” Zelda says, and her tone is cold in a way that makes Link wish things were different. She’s not being cold towards him but towards…everyone else.

He wishes there was a way to change what they’ve both lost.

“So Dark? What would you like to do?” Link asks. “Stay here or…”

The world goes a little off kilter again and he stumbles into Zelda, her soft noise of surprise barely registering as Dark takes shape before him once more.

“I do not wish to stay here,” he says. “I know you are too soft to kill me, so instead, I will ask you to show me the horse of the Ganon who created me, and the sunset, and that dragon. The one when you…when you fell in love.”

Link nods. He will show Dark the things he wishes to see and give him the release he seeks. He just…hates that it’s the best they can do. Dark’s form melts away from sight.

**_Soft_ **

It must be a sign of affection that Dark doesn’t say puppet this time. Zelda’s expression is pinched up into something that’s caught between anger and sadness, which is honestly what Link feels too.

“He wants…to see certain things,” Link says. “Can you help him get into my mind long enough to make that happen?”

"Yes, but it’s going to take some work,” Zelda says.

“He wants to meet Madwebiisaan so I’m going to have to go get him,” Link says. “Do you need me here with you?”

“No, it’s okay,” Zelda says. “I can protect myself if our friend here gets any ideas.”

**_Both soft_ **

Link can tell from Zelda’s expression that Dark must’ve projected that loud enough for both of them to here because Zelda’s eyes widen and she looks back towards the capsule. He wonders if it would be possible for them to be friends. In another time maybe, in a time where they didn’t all have baggage and trauma creating an uncrossable gulf between them. He opens his Sheikah Slate and teleports for the Dueling Peaks Stable.

-.-

Link rides Madwebiisaan to the Great Plateau, leaving him at the base of it with a few carrots for his trouble. He’d explained his plan to the giant horse on their ride. Knowing now, with certainty, the intelligence and near immortality of Madwebiisaan, he found himself talking with him often when he was traveling on his own. He’s gotten better at reaching out to his friends when he’s lonely, but he still prefers to travel alone. If he’s with Madwebiisaan though, he's less alone than he would be with another horse.

When he arrives back at the Shrine of Resurrection, Zelda is sitting cross-legged on the ground with her Sheikah Slate in her lap, frowning down at it.

“I did some more poking around,” she says when he takes a seat beside her. “I had to double check and get a sample from Zora’s Domain, but the water source used in this Shrine is from there, albeit significantly older. Well over ten thousand years.”

“That’s where Dark was when he was first created by Ganon,” Link says. “So that’s not surprising.”

“Perhaps, but I’m wondering if the reason the water was chosen was due to its own properties,” Zelda says. “It was in a temple, yes?”

“As far as I can remember,” Link says. “At the bottom of Lake Hylia.”

Zelda glances towards the south, where not very far away at all, Lake Hylia still rests. “There are so many threads and connections I wish I could make sense of, and yet there’s almost nothing for me to consult. I…the only memories I have are my own.”

“Is there anything you could tell us Dark?” Link asks.

**_No. Never left_ **

Zelda sighs, turning the screen of her Sheikah Slate off. “I figured as much. I’m sorry. If we knew more perhaps we could help you live-“

**_Don’t want_ **

Link looks over at her, hating the sadness he sees in her eyes but it’s just what he feels too. For all their own struggles, they cannot begin to understand Dark’s position.

“Are you both ready?” Zelda asks, getting to her feet and heading for the console that controls the Shrine.

“Yes,” Link says.

**_Yes_ **

She slips her Sheikah Slate into the console and begins to work. The malice bubbles up and then begins to drain away, leaving only the cool water he’d woken up in behind. At Zelda’s gesturing, he sets his weapons aside and then climbs into the capsule, clothes and all, ignoring the choking fear that comes to him as he does so. He remembers the way he and Sidon had talked about the body remembering things the mind didn’t.

He does not like this place. Not at all.

**_Me neither_ **

Dark’s voice startles a laugh out of him and he supposes in an odd way, despite Dark’s initial hostility, realizing he’s not alone in his discomfort and trauma is…helpful. It feels a bit like when he freed the spirits of the former Champions from the Divine Beasts. Thinking about it like that…in many ways, Dark has been dead for years. Now, they are just giving him comfort and peace, and some autonomy over his final hours, and if he frames it like that, Link supposes he doesn’t feel too bad.

“This may hurt, Link,” Zelda says as the capsule begins to whir from its internal mechanisms. “But only because of the malice that may come back up. It’ll be temporary.”

“Understood,” he says.

He can feel the moment Dark re-enters his mind. It’s stronger this time, the weight of his thoughts and emotions pressing in on him and making him struggle to breathe. The pressure keeps mounting, and he’s aware, distantly, of the malice Zelda warned him of, creeping over his legs and hands and arms, but just as she said it’s all temporary. A moment later, the malice vanishes. A sensation like a popping joint radiates through him and it’s as if Dark has been sectioned off, taking up residence in a small corner of his mind.

“Oh. Hello,” he says.

 ** _“You really don’t have any sense of self-preservation do you?”_** Dark asks, his voice clear now in Link’s mind.

“No, not really,” Link says. “Zelda?”

“As I said, this connection is very unstable, but it is there for now,” Zelda says as Link sits up and when she looks up her face goes pale. “Link?”

“What?” he asks. He looks down at himself and…oh. Well. His clothing is black now, like coal, and when he looks at his hands it’s not skin he sees, but rather a shiny oil-like substance, and he’s quite confident if he looks in a mirror he’ll see the mask Kilton had created staring back at him. “It’s fine. I’m still me. What were you saying?”

“Um…the connection between you two,” she says. “It’s unstable. If it breaks while you’re in the Shrine, Dark will just sort of dissipate into the Shrine again, but if you move far enough away, he’ll just…melt away after a while.”

“Okay,” Link says. “Let’s see how far away I can get then.”

He pulls himself up out of the capsule, stumbling a little as he does so and he can feel Dark in the back of his mind instinctively trying to move, his own thoughts crossing over with Link’s and confusing their shared limbs.

**_“Sorry. I’ll stop.”_ **

Link tests moving again and when the motion is clear, he moves to pick up his sword. The Master Sword flares to life and he recoils. “Oh. I guess that makes sense.”

“It’s fine,” Zelda says. “I’ll hold onto it.”

“I’m…after this I’m going to Zora’s Domain,” Link says. “Can you bring it there, after you make sure all of this is…well. Taken care of?”

Zelda nods. “Of course.”

After a brief moment of hesitation, for what Link isn’t sure, he heads out of the cavern, clambering over the ledges that lead to the outside world. The sun is just starting to set now, the sky turning a brilliant shade of orange fire. With Dark being bonded so close to him now, he can feel the flickers of Dark’s fascination, coupled with the awe that comes with seeing something beautiful. It makes him realize how far he’s come in identifying what his own feelings are.

"Have you ever seen a sun set?” he asks.

" _Not with my own eyes. I have only ever known the Water Temple of ages past and that shrine.”_

The words make Link’s chest ache with sorrow, but he isn’t sure if it’s his own or Dark’s, the feeling so powerful and washing over him that for a moment, he can’t think clearly. He tries to inhale. It does nothing to relieve the sudden tension in his chest and a moment later, he feels Dark scrabbling around on the inside of his mind, gathering up all the feelings until they’re locked away once more.

“No,” Link says, wiping at his eyes as tears fall from the corners of them. “It’s okay. You don’t have to hide it.”

 ** _“I may despise you for things outside of your control but that does not mean I wish to burden you with my own feelings. You are doing more than enough for me already,”_** Dark says.

Link steps forward, heading down towards the Temple of Time. “It’s a few hours. The last thing I want is for you to…to spend your last few hours trying to hold yourself back at all, okay? Please…”

Perhaps it’s odd how deeply he can come to care for something created by Ganon in such a short period of time, but then again, they are twined together now. And really…he knows they’re two different sides of the same coin – puppets, mourning the loss of what had to be removed for them to be bent to the will of others. Like a trickling stream, the feelings leak back in, sorrow and rage pervading his senses and thoughts, but now that he’s ready for it, it’s easy to bare.

He pauses at the steps that lead up to the Temple of Time. “Do you want to see it?”

**_“Yes.”_ **

Link heads back up the steps, remembering the last time he was here with Sidon. He feels a bit as if he’s in a new role now, the one who’s the provider of comfort and solace as they enter a place that carries so much history, and with it, the trauma of ages past.

 ** _“I know he was moved back and forth through time here,”_** Dark says as Link heads through the chapel and down between the pews. **_“But the power to do that…there’s no power here at all.”_**

“They moved it,” Link says as he comes to stand before the rubble of the Goddess Hylia statue he had destroyed. “And hid what remained with a statue.”

" _You destroyed a statue of the Goddess Hylia? And she did not strike you down?”_ Dark asks, the amusement apparent in his tone. It cuts through the grief and anger. 

“Did Ganon strike you down when you were stolen by the Sheikah for their own devices?” Link asks.

" _Hm. I suppose masters don’t care much what happens to their toys when they’re done with them,”_ Dark says.

Link stares down at the pedestal, empty and devoid of the power it once contained to let someone enter and leave the Sacred Realm. It’s frustrating, the way Hylia and Ganon both discard them like a broken pedestal. They’re weapons that have gone to rust, a tool that’s broken and not worth repair, and yet despite the fact that such higher powers feel nothing towards them, Link finds himself…grateful. In a way, it means that once his duty is fulfilled, he’s free of whatever the Goddess wants of him.

**_“Well aren’t you the positive one?”_ **

“There’s things I want to live for now,” Link says. “You know what they are. You’re in my head.”

That seems to be enough to silence Dark for a little while, but Link can tell from how closely they’re entwined that Dark isn’t really offended. If anything, he’s…pleased. Part of him wants to dig at why, but Dark is welcome to whatever secrets he wants. It’s only fair after all.

He heads out of the temple and down onto the Great Plateau, charting the same path he once had with Sidon as he heads for the rear so that he can more easily reach Madwebiisaan and Lake Hylia. The air has a chill to it now, the cool sensation whipping across his skin. He can feel Dark in his mind cataloguing the sensation and for a moment, he must pause again, the sense of mourning becoming too strong.

 ** _“Is it silly to mourn for something I’ve only just experienced?”_** Dark asks. For a creature that’s lived for thousands of years, he sounds terribly small.

“No,” Link whispers past the tightness in his throat. “I just wish I could…do more for you.”

 ** _“I appreciate you allowing me to experience a little bit of life, but trust me when I say I am long past my time,”_** Dark says. **_“I truly have no wish to linger in this world. I am not like those Moblins and Bokoblins you see dancing around their fires. I have no ties here. No capacity for things like friends or love or family.”_**

“I don’t believe that,” Link says.

**_“A creature created from the dark malice of Ganon is not capable of these things, no matter how appealing the idea may be.”_ **

Link doesn’t know if Dark is just lying for his benefit or the both of them. Perhaps Dark does wish to cease to exist and finally get the rest he deserves and has craved for thousands of years. Or, perhaps he wishes to have something like a real life, but knowing it’s unlikely would prefer to use his agency and make his own decisions. It’s hard to know. As connected as they are, Dark manages to keep that part of himself quite hidden it seems.

They reach the edge of the Great Plateau and Link pulls his paraglider from his back before running towards the edge and jumping off as he has countless times before. He can feel Dark pushing at his mind, and he obliged, turning to gaze over Lake Hylia. The anger, while not unexpected surges forth so hot and fast that he almost loses grip on his paraglider. He’s not sure which is worse – the sadness or the anger.

“We can still go back,” he says as they approach the ground. “If you want us to try and find a way to exist on your own and…experience something new.”

**_“Don’t be foolish. I want to die. Why do you think I tried to trick you into killing me by influencing your mind?”_ **

Link lands on the ground, stumbling a little. He folds the paraglider back up and straps it to his back as he straightens and looks across the field to where he left Madwebiisaan.

"If you want to die, why did you try to fight Kilton off?”

There’s no way Dark can deny that part. Link had seen the remnants of Dark’s desperate struggle to stay out of Kilton’s clutches splattered all over the shrine.

" _It’s not that I wanted to live. I just didn’t want my agency stolen from me any longer, turned into yet another tool for someone to use. That’s all.”_

Link supposes that makes sense. Of course it could be another lie Dark is telling to convince them both, but if he concentrates, he can feel the conviction and sincerity in Dark. Who’s to know what powers could come to rip his agency away again? Ganon created him, so undoubtedly Ganon could control him once more. Likely the only reason he hadn’t this time was because Zelda had restricted the Calamity to the castle, limiting his influence and control to some degree.

Or perhaps the shrine itself kept Ganon’s influence at bay. It’s not like that was truly any better. A cage was still a cage, regardless of its purpose or the intentions of the jailer.

 ** _“I do appreciate the kindness you are extending to me,”_** Dark says as Link approaches Madwebiisaan near the Great Plateau’s base. **_“It is nice to leave the control of the Sheikah and Ganon both on a kinder note than I started with, though I do worry for the toll this will take on you when I inevitably fall apart.”_**

They near Madwebiisaan and come to stand before him. Link can feel Dark examining Madwebiisaan with his eyes, taking in not just the physical but the energy within him as well. It’s a key difference between them. Link has never been all that aware of magic – the Master Sword is genuinely the closest he’s ever come to having magic of his own. Power moves through him. It’s not something he’s ever controlled the way he’s seen Zelda or Wizzrobes or the Zora, Gerudo, Rito, or Gorons do.

Dark though, perhaps because of how he was created, seems to be in tune with the energy that radiates off Madwebiisaan. Seeing him now through Dark’s eyes, Link finds it hard to believe he ever thought Madwebiisaan could simply be a descendent of some powerful horse in the past. His age and might is far more apparent this way.

 ** _“Ah. Yes. This is Ganon’s horse from back then,”_** Dark says.

Madwebiisaan gazes down at them with his usual intelligence that far exceeds that of the average horse and then bends his neck down to butt his head against Link’s. Feelings that aren’t his well up inside him again and before he can think, his arms are wrapped around Madwebiisaan’s neck. Except he knows it’s not him. It’s Dark in control of his limbs, it’s Dark clinging to Madwebiisaan’s mane and stretching up on his tiptoes. It’s Dark having a moment of respite from knowing that there is another creature who understands what it’s like to be created and cast aside when he’s outlived his usefulness.

 ** _“It’s nice to know I am not the only remnant of my time to be left alone, though I suppose he is not alone when he has you now,”_ **Dark says.

“Is he like you?” Link asks as they release Madwebiisaan together and then move to swing up into the saddle. “Will he…could Ganon control him if he came back? Like a monster?”

 ** _“No. He is a horse first, infused with the magic of Demise, the original dark power that Hylia wars against,”_** Dark says. **_“I am created purely from the blood and soul of Ganon himself. I could never hope to resist his commands.”_**

It makes Dark’s decision seem so much clearer when he says it so plainly. How could he hope to have what Link does? Even if they did pull him from the shrine so he could roam the world and seek what he wanted, they didn’t know when and how Ganon would return. The endless cycle they are trapped in necessitates only that he _will_. The when, the how, they are all mysteries. The people of Hyrule figured out how to see move on and live their lives anyways, as they always had, ready for his return but never letting the fear of it hold them back.

Part of that was likely due to the existence of Zelda and the existence of himself. Just as Ganon’s return was foretold, so too were their roles. They could rest easier knowing that. Dark had no such comfort. If Ganon were to return, any life he built for himself could be ripped away, destroyed by his own hands if Ganon so wished it, and with such a threat looming over him with no hope of rescue from it, the only agency he could exercise was to remove himself from Ganon’s control entirely.

“It’s not fair,” Link says as Madwebiisaan starts across the bridge. The sun approaches the peaks of Death Mountain in the distance.

**_“Of course not. But it is all I have left.”_ **

Madwebiisaan pauses at the middle of the bridge and after taking a breath, Link willingly lets Dark take control of his body the way he can feel he wants him to. He steps around the center piece of the middle of the bridge and walks towards the side of the bridge that faces the setting sun as opposed to the Sheikah Shrine that is likely built on top of the very place Dark was created. Link understands why he doesn’t wish to see it.

“Do you like it?”

**_“The sunset? Yes. I’ve never seen…the colors.”_ **

The joy Link feels in his chest feels so tentative and careful, like he doesn’t dare feel it. “Isn’t that the point of this? To help you experience this?”

" ** _Ah. Yes. I suppose it is.”_**

Madwebiisaan bumps his head into the center of Link’s back before coming to stand behind him, providing something for him to lean back against as he stares out over the lake and the fields as the sun begins to vanish behind the mountains. The sky grows darker with the rich reds and oranges that bleed into the deep purples and navy blues that start to give way to the black of night. He watches and feels as Dark takes it all in.

Energy ripples through the air and Link takes back control to turn them and see Farosh on the other side of the lake beginning his winding journey up out of the lake and into the air.

 ** _“These…did not exist in my time,”_** Dark says.

“There’s three of them, representing each part of the Triforce,” Link says. “Farosh represents the one I have…”

**_“Is that why I feel so drawn to him?”_ **

**_"_** Maybe it’s his proximity to Lake Hylia,” Link says.

They watch as Farosh heads straight up through the air, undulating his body as he spirals higher and then begins to chart a path for them. Sometimes his path is different, but usually he descends back into the lake before carving back up again and disappearing into the sky, vanishing through a portal of some kind, perhaps some place mystical. Free of Hylia and Ganon both.

 ** _“That sounds like a good place to be,”_** Dark says.

The air turns to static as Farosh approaches, and a few seconds later Link feels…odd. Like he’s shaking, but not on the outside, but the inside, like his very veins are trembling with some unknown power.

 ** _“I think we are falling apart,”_** Dark says. **_“It must be this Farosh. His power.”_**

Link stumbles over to the edge of the bridge, narrowing his eyes and focusing on Farosh as he tries to catalogue the sensations washing through his body. He looks down at his hands and yes, he sees it now. The oil-like malice bubbles up across his skin, gathering in patches and exposing his real skin beneath it before continuing to bubble and pop, disconnecting from his body and floating up into the air instead. The bubbles hover for a moment before drifting to the almost magnetic pull that Farosh seems to have.

“Dark?”

 ** _“Do you think he will take me up with him?”_** Dark’s voice sounds strong in his head, but Link can feel his fear.

He swallows and takes a few stumbling steps so that he can be closer to Farosh, letting out a harsh breath when Madwebiisaan walks up beside him, giving him something to lean on. “Maybe. Hopefully. I can try to help.”

" _Thank you.”_

Link doesn’t know how to say he doesn’t want Dark’s thanks in a moment like this without sounding rude, so he says nothing at all and makes his way to where Farosh will be crossing the bridge in just a handful of seconds. The pull of Farosh’s power makes his chest feel tight, the air humming with electricity that seems to rip the malice, rip Dark, from his body at an ever-increasing rate as Farosh draws closer.

“I’m sorry,” Link chokes out. “I couldn’t do more…”

**_“I’ve been alone for thousands of years. It was nice to not be alone. For…”_ **

The malice sloughs off his hand like a sheet and Link stretches his hand up towards Farosh, giving it the push it needs to fade into the electrical static that fills the air as Farosh passes overhead.

“Dark?”

**_Not alone. For. Awhile. Nice._ **

Link can’t respond to that, because the next moment, pain ricochets through him, sharp lightning like barbs that seem to claw their way out of his arms and shoulders, his face and neck, and even as he falls to his knees, he can see the malice leaving his body. He feels Dark come apart in his mind, feels as he’s torn from the spaces between Link’s thoughts where he’d nestled in.

He sucks in a lungful of air and as he lets it out, he feels the last tether that connects them snap. In such a short period of time, he had come to feel so close to Dark. They had been entwined together on every level, and now he’s…alone. Shockingly, and painfully alone, alone in a way he’s never felt before, and as he turns over onto his back and stares up at Farosh’s underbelly he wonders if Dark had always been inside him.

From the very beginning. From the moment his power had been used to pull Link back from the brink of death, he must have left something inside him, something that left them connected to one another even when Link stayed away. And now…now between taking Dark from the shrine and Farosh’s all-encompassing power, they were separated once more.

Could he mourn the loss of something he had never realized he’d had in the first place?

Farosh vanishes from his line of sight, but Link doesn’t move from where he lays, not even when Madwebiisaan plods over and sits down beside him with a snort and rests his large snout on the arm Link has flailed out to his side. He doesn’t touch the tears he can feel streaming from his eyes and into his hair. He just lies still and waits until Farosh appears in view once more, this time stretching his way back up towards the sky.

“I hate Ganon,” Link says. “I hate him. And I hate Hylia. And I hate that I’m so full of hate.”

Beside him, Madwebiisaan huffs out what must be an agreement. Link watches the sky until Farosh is out of sight and the last of the electric energy fades away with the wind as the stars wink into existence. He wishes they’d had more time. He wishes he could’ve shown Dark everything he’d shown Sidon, but he supposes…he did give Dark the most precious gift of all. He’d given him the comfort of no longer being alone.

And Link knows more than anyone just how powerful that gift can be.


End file.
